Once Time Passed (A Burdened Novel Book 4), page 6
“Is today your off day?” he asks.
“Yep. No class, no work. I’m just going to lie down and rest.”
He frowns heavily and knits his bushy eyebrows. “I’m not of fan of rest.”
“Aren’t you? Well, what do you do when you get tired?”
He jumps up and jabs his hips with his fists. “I never get tired, Tracey. I’m Superman! I can stay up all night and all day.”
I tackle him with tickles and he turns into a fit of laughs. “Well, Superman, some of us don’t have that superpower.”
He grabs my hands, stopping my tickling. His joyful expression is washed away quicker than it came. There’s a stomach-turning sadness in his childish voice as he says, “My mommy doesn’t have that superpower. Today, she hasn’t gotten out of the bed at all. I tried to give her some of my strength, but it didn’t work.”
I sit back and pull him on my lap. Taylor has yet to get over Justin’s death, I’ll never forget that day either, but most days are worse than others. Hugging Jason, I say, “I’m sure you made her feel great, Jason. She may just be tired and need some sleep to let the energy you gave her reenergize her.”
“Sleep gives you energy too?”
“Yep. Sleep and food!”
“Maybe I should make her an apple pie!” He jumps up and bounces on the bed. “That’ll do it!”
I laugh. “How about we go out for some ice cream and buy her an apple pie, and she can have it when she wakes up.”
Jason plops down on the bed with his legs crossed. “Good idea. But you’ll have to get on some clothes; you’re still in your PJs, Tracey.”
Looking over myself, I nod, agreeing with him.
After dressing and breakfast, Jason and I head out for ice cream and in search of apple pie. For a three-year-old, he is very good at keeping up a conversation, and doesn’t miss a beat. We’ve talked about every kid show that comes on in the morning and afternoon, every plot of each children’s book on the bookshelves, and how long it took him to match his socks after the last time they were washed. It specifically took a quadrillion days.
I clean strawberry ice cream from his mouth before we leave the ice cream parlor. When we’re all clean, we head for the bakery a few doors down, and boy if I knew there were so many different kinds of apple pies, I would have agreed to bake one. An hour later, Jason decides on Dutch apple pie and a cherry pie, and we head home.
Jason shoots up the stairs when we make it in the house. “Mommy, Mommy!” he calls from the hall. “I got you some apple pie! And it’s delicious! We got to taste every pie in the bakery! It was like a hundred of them, Mommy!”
Closing the front door, I listen for Taylor’s footsteps to cross the floor, but not even the bed creaks.
Jason knocks on the door and rattles the locked knob. “Mommy! I said I got you apple pie!” His excitement dwindles. “Mommy?”
I come up behind him. “Hey big guy?” He turns to face me, hand extending to meet mine. “How about we go downstairs and read that book we got from the store. Mommy will come down when she wakes up.”
Sad eyes match his frown, but Jason nods. I carry him downstairs to the family room and we settle on the loveseat. I crack open How Joey Crossed the Tracks, and two pages in, Jason’s knocked out. I lay him flat on the seat and cover him up with the blanket resting on the armrest. Sitting on the floor with my back to the chair, I trade his book for one of my own.
I read the first line of the first chapter, ‘It was easier to ignore than it was to forget.’ I sigh, but consider if that is at all possible. Laying my head back on the chair, a glimmer on the bookshelf catches my eye. I roll my eyes at the hourglass and open the book back to read the next line.
The hourglass continues to glimmer, taunting me for my attention. The more I try to avoid looking at it, the more it heckles me. Even when I draw the book nearer my eyes to eliminate my surrounding, the droplets of sand landing and rolling down the sandy hill sound over the silence.
The last of the sunlight beams through the window, casting a shadow of the heart on the wall of the brown bookshelf on which it sits. Standing, I stomp across the floor and snatch the damn thing from the shelf. With all my might, I smash it against the floor. Its shatter is soundless. The obsidian heart and skull once enclosed by the glass, look up at me, burning in my eyes and clawing at my heart.
I expect for the contents to dissolve as I recall them doing before. They don’t. The heart and skull sit among the sand, and I want for them to do something magical.
Maybe tell me the secrets to the universe. . .
I reach for the skull and snatch my hand back from it being scorching hot. Willing my right hand black, enabling the resistant texture of my palm and fingers, I’m able to pick up the skull without it burning. When I lift it from the floor, the sand shades black from the clear crystal it was.
‘He who is possessed, yet can bear a heart of love to accept the wicked soul,’ reads across the back of the skull. If a person is possessed, they can’t bear a heart because they don’t own that heart. The heart belongs to the body—the person—the entity influenced. Maybe, that’s the catch. Because something can’t happen, that’s what makes it special that it’s happening. Or, is it like being Burdened where they are, in a way, possessed, and to start, they have their own hearts until they mate and undertake the heart of their mate or give their hearts away. But, what does it mean to accept a wicked soul? The one who’s possessed or the one who bears the heart of love?
I set the skull on the bookshelf, putting death aside and moving on to love. Assuming the heart is an indication of love. The heart’s rough and hot like a rock of lava, and in an instant, as I’m steadying it in my grasp, it bursts into a gray smog. The cloud crowds my face. I want not to inhale it, but with my gasp, it’s unavoidable. The smog snakes through my nose and the smell of lavender calms my senses, but a stinging, unsettling sensation stabs me in the chest.
Escaping the clear crystals and shards of glass charging after me, I jump back, scraping my nails over my arms, hoping to get the scabby feeling off me. Tripping, I fall backward, back hitting the floor. For a second, I’m surrounded, black and clear crystals blanketing my body, the thick gray cloud smothering me. It pins me to the floor, and I gasp for air, clawing at anything around me to pull myself free, and cringe for release.
Then, there’s nothing.
I’m free, scrambling to my feet, scraping my hands over my arms and legs. Checking my surroundings, I scan the room for the shattered glass, the skull, or the heart, but only the skull sits on the bookshelf, empty eyes boring through mine, and the reflection from the last of the sunlight beaming off the obsidian.
What the hell was that? “Hallucination maybe?” I test the idea aloud. An odd presence alerts me to a feeling that makes me straighten my spine and become eager to find . . . something.
I scavenge through the bookshelf, and rip up the rug. I move the furniture around and snatch the cushions from the sofas. “Where is it,” I hear myself mutter, but have no idea what I’m searching for. “It’s not here,” I say after dropping to my knees to see the room at a different angle.
“You okay, Tracey?”
I whip around, meeting Jason’s tired eyes. “Yes. Of course, big guy.” Picking him up, I carry him to Olar’s room. I’m knocking. Olar pulls the door open and looks as if he were napping himself. “You mind keeping an eye on Jason until Taylor gets up? I’m going to run out for a bit.”
Taking Jason, Olar asks, “Where you going?”
Shrugging, I say, “I’m not sure exactly. I just need to go. I’ll call if I need you,” I beat him to his offer.
“Fine.” He goes back in the room, leaving the door open and lays Jason beside him.
I Will Remember You
I lift the garage and press the clicker to unlock the doors to Nathan’s car. Today, I’ve spent a lot of time in his car sense Laine and Little Nathan took mine. It’s been over a year since I’ve sat in it, and with Jason being a distraction, I hadn’t realized that. It makes me uncomfortable; thinking about us and it cricks my neck every time.
It smells like him so much, as though his aura lived in the interior. Would it be too much to ask for his scent to have died with him? Including the one on me? Maybe that’s too harsh, for me to believe he should be at rest, but every time I breathe I want to cuss and scream at him for doing nothing! He could’ve fought back! Why didn’t he fight back? He could’ve eliminated all of them, without even looking, he could’ve saved himself. There had to be a sign he should’ve seen, some kind of an impression on Olar when he brought him there to die. I hate him for not fighting back. “Dammit, Nathan!” I scream, slamming my hand against the stirring wheel over and over. “Why, dammit? Just . . .why. . .?”
Grunting, I throw myself back on the seat and stay pressed there, waiting for the ache to pass. As it subsides, I turn the ignition and the country song that played the first time we took the ride in his truck to the docks flows through the speakers.
If the sunshine never saw your face,
And the moonlight never cried,
Would I have you to restore my faith?
Could you be my lullaby?
If I told you that I’ll hold your hand,
And you told me you’d caress my skin,
Could the moonlight break between our hearts?
Would the sunlight spare this part?
I wanna love you, when I can’t love you,
I wanna hold you, when the world says no,
I wanna love you, when I can’t love you,
I wanna love you, when my heart says so.
It takes me back to a time we were in a place where I was so unsure and yet, so positive about being with a total stranger that I knew it wouldn’t make sense to most of the world. But, I dived in head first and if I had the chance do it again, I would. There’d be some things I’d change, like bonding so soon and getting a fuller understanding of mating. Things within me just moved so fast, emotions and nerves were so demanding it took over thoughts and actions, and I couldn’t consider what I know now. But dammit if someone offers me a second chance, boy wouldn’t I jump at it. Just to have him. . . I want him back so badly.
Mating is one hundred percent uncontrollable, it’s fate. Although, it can happen unbeknownst to one party, I imagine for the party who knows they’re mated, it must be hell to live without that other person. A lifelong pull to one person, and never enjoying the full of love or life. Much like when someone’s mate dies. My body’s still craving for Nathan, willing to give up all logic to be with him.
Bonding, while controllable, is very hard to avoid. Every nerve of the body, for me anyway, aches and even desires a single person in every way possible. The physical is the most powerful; to fully link to one’s mate and explore realms of one another in a way humans could never experience. Mentally, it’s exhausting; being too far united with one another, but the connection is so powerful it links the mates even if they’re in two different countries. I believe I got the short end of the stick, being human and mated to a Burdened Sephlem is the ultimate worst. My body was introduced to so many feelings and powers and emotions at one time, and the only way I knew how to handle them was to fully give in to them. I poured it all on Nathan, and every time we kissed and made love he excepted it as if it were nothing but empty feelings, when, really, it filled him up too, so much so, his beast was becoming more powerful, which resulted in frequent feedings just to keep it at ease.
Lastly, being made. A level I’ll not get to experience, but wish it were in my future. It’s the beauty of it, so I hear. Natalia said that it’s the final step, when things settle down and though your mate and you are still as one, the effects of the bonding deplete and you live in the moment. It sounded great. To not crave another being, or require him, but to just exist with him. I wanted to just exist with Nathan.
The song fades and is replaced by a mattress commercial that I turn down. Just as I’m changing my mind about leaving, a loud caw draws my attention to an American crow perched on the hood of the car. Draped in charcoal black feathers with a beak to match, its silk-like wings spread and it caws again with more aggression than the first.
I jump a little and hit the windshield wipers, hoping to scare it away.
It caws twice more and flaps its wings, thrusting a gust of dusty wind at the windshield before taking off in flight.
Leaning forward, I look beyond the corner of the garage for the direction it flew, but it’s too fast to track. “That’s weird,” I mutter, leaning back against the seat, scraping my nails across my outer arm. It’s reddening, vines shaking. That damn misty stuff has them freaking out. Hell, I’m freaking out! I don’t know if I hallucinated the whole thing, but a part of me is uncomfortable with it.
Cawing as it lands, the crow perches on the hood of the car and stares at me.
Wide-eyed and anxious, I ask, “What?”
As if it understands, it caws again and looks away from me, toward the street. When it turns back, our eyes meet, and I gasp, taken aback by the darkness in its gaze, the awareness in its bore, the sparseness in its stare. Eyes so dark, they’re filled with so much life. They reflect my own and a shiver climbs up my spine.
Another caw screeches through my ears and snaps me out of the trance. The crow takes off and another huge gust of wind explodes in the wake of its departure.
“Um. . . Okay. . .” I’ve done worse things. I mean, following a crow is a little farfetched, but how much worse can it get?
I Found
I ease on the brakes when I come to a covered bridge that’s sat over a dark, rushing river. Night’s sunk around me and the time’s nearing ten. Hitting the brights, I observe the town-like village beyond the bridge, and struggling consider shifting the car in reverse. Gas burning lanterns dimly light the streets while others brighten porches of homes made up of mud and large wood logs. Spots around the small town hide in darkness and my imagination runs away from me with what’s hiding out there.
The crow turns around from flying through the tunnel. It perches on the hood of the car and looks in the direction of the dark entrance. Rescanning what I can of the small town, I mutter, “What time warp have you brought me through?” The town looks like something straight out of The Village, and I hated how that movie ended.
Even in the darkness, when the crows and my eyes meet, they tell a timeless story of a bird that’s falling through the sky. It’s midday, the sun is so hot it’s burning the feathers on its belly. Though its wings look well enough to fly, it doesn’t. It falls, wings splayed, seeming accepting of its fate. Maybe hopeful for it. But, just before it hits the ground, it’s snatched out of the sky, saved by something the crow doesn’t reveal.
Despite my gut telling me not to go, I ease off the brakes and the car slowly rolls over the bridge. It’s a blind trust that crow is hinting to me, and something in me is forcing me to see this through.
The crow lands on the roof of a small cottage. Through tall grass, I drive to the space in front of the home, and retract my seatbelt. The earth is strong as though nothing but rain maintained the area. Ivy climbs the walls of the cottage, this one built with brick instead of logs. Moss has drowned the roof, and branches of a tall tree growing beside the home cascades onto the house like a waterfall.
Tall grass brushes the car door as I push it open. Closing it, after a struggle to keep the grass from getting stuck, I don’t let it sound. The air’s cold, but not as chilly as it has been. I’m hoping spring will bring back the life in the flowers I planted around the house. Ones like these. I squat down near a tree and smell the array of sweet alyssums.
On the roof, the crow watches me. I trudge through the thick grass and then climb the three moss covered steps of the porch to reach the front door.
Footsteps approach the door before I can knock. “Who’s there,” an older voice asks.
I’m silent, unsure of what to say or how to explain my intrusion. “Hi. I’m sorry to bother you, ma’am. I was just in the neighborhood and wanted to. . .” For Pete’s sake, she’ll know I’m lying. No one probably ever travels out here.
The door whips open and an older woman acclaims, “Love?”
“I’m sorry?”
Slapping around her long, wooden cane that’s dressed in vines made up of mercury; they start at the cane’s bottom, a silver cylinder incasing a heart like the one from the hourglass are where the vines grow from and right up to the metal handle clutched tightly in her hand. “Love. . .” Bright gray, marble-like eyes look my direction. She waves me forward, but I don’t move.
“Ma’am, honestly, I don’t mean to disturb you. I don’t even know what I’m doing here.” I don’t know why I was in a rush to leave my home, or why the hell I’m following crows to the weeping willow lodges.
Putting her weight on her cane, she hunches over and extends her hand. “It doesn’t matter what, not even how, but why.”
“I don’t know that either. I just followed a bird. It wasn’t my intention to bother anyone.” Something taps my ankle, and I excuse myself, “Again, ma’am, I’m sorry I bothered you. I’ll be on my way.” I turn to head back to the car.
Behind me, she whispers, “She who is of love, yet can bear a wicked heart to accept the beast of oppression. And he, the he of he’s who is oppressed, yet can bear a heart of love—her love—to accept the wicked soul. You, love, have stumbled upon my door step by no mistake, even if death brought you here.” Turning on my heels, I face her. She nods and waves me forward again, offering, “Tea?”
“I don’t like tea. But if you have a cold glass of water. . .”
Frankincense fills my nose on entry. It relaxes the tension in my shoulders and calms my uneasiness as I follow behind her. The walls are of the same oak wood that makes up the floor and the ceiling with potho plants draping across it from corner to corner.
